There's no stress release quite like exercise. Yesterday, after listening to Ned leave Sheets in to get pounded in a six-run inning, I took my bike out for a ride. I was almost home when a car pulled up alongside me with a rottweiler in the back, head out the window. The rottweiler snaps at me. I swerve away and stop on my bike, allowing the car to get some distance. The car stops at a stop sign and the rottweiler JUMPS OUT. By the time I got home, I had forgotten all about the loss.

Win Expectancy Graph
BR Box Score
BDD Box Score

Dave Pinto at Baseball Musings wants to know the same thing I'm asking: Where was the bullpen yesterday?

Jim Powell has a new blog up. Topics covered include yesterday's game, Bobby Thomson, Ryan Braun's contract, Mark Attanasio and the upcoming trip to Boston.

Big League Stew also interviewed Bob Uecker, but the questions had more to do with Mr. Belvedere than baseball.

Bugs and Cranks has the Brewers 17th in their most recent power poll. Is snark required here? I've lost my decoder ring.

This has been done to death, I know, but Fangraphs still thinks the Padres won the Scott Linebrink trade.

On injuries:

Mariners utilityman Willie Bloomquist harvested too many razor clams and was fined $50.
Twins OF Carlos Gomez missed yesterday's game with the flu.
Nats 1B Nick Johnson will miss 4-6 weeks with a torn tendon sheath in his wrist.
White Sox 2B Juan Uribe left last night's game with a leg injury.

I don't recall if I've mentioned it here or not, but Paul DePodesta is blogging now. On the surface it seems like a great idea, but Gaslamp Ball notes that some of the comments he's getting are getting increasingly obnoxious. I'd rather have my front office personnel working on improving the team, personally.

Some people know what it takes to win: Brandon Webb is 9-0.

And some people don't: Reds IF/OF Jerry Hairston reportedly told Marlins 1B Wes Helms he thinks the Marlins will win the East, because they're gritty.

Speaking of former Brewers, Glendon Rusch declined an outright assignment to the minors and is now a free agent. Supposedly the Rockies are interested. Really?

Apparently Andruw Jones only hits changeups. Did someone tell Ben Sheets?

I think everyone stashes change sometimes. I keep mine in a giant plastic parking meter. But I've never managed to accumulate 150,000 pennies, and even if I did I probably wouldn't stash them in a teammate's locker.

I'm not sure if it'll help you make 150,000 pennies, but Baseball Digest Daily is looking for writers.

And, by the way, here's the most bizarre animation you'll ever see made from graffiti. Incredible.

The Mug is off tomorrow and Sunday so I can go back to driving all over the midwest. Drink up.

Well, that sucked.

Fortunately, we've got a Ben Sheets start to look forward to that ought to help get the bad taste out of our mouths.  Sheets has a 3.15 ERA in his last 5 starts against the Dodgers, which is nice to hear, but doesn't mean much, since that's about one start per year stretching back to 2003.  Chad Billingsley goes for the other guys.

Here's the BR Game Preview.  Start time is 12:05 CT.

Go Brewers!

A winning streak!  (Sort of.)  Ben Sheets looks to keep it going against Joel Pineiro.  Fun facts about Pineiro: he won his only career start against the Brewers, and he has faced Jason Kendall more than the rest of the Milwaukee offense combined. 

More matchups, as always, at the BR Game Preview, which reminds us that Rickie now has an .833 OPS against Isringhausen.  Hmm...did that go up last night?

Game time is a TV-friendly 2:40 CT.

Go Brewers!

Remember Saturday, when I Mugged from the road? I'm back on the road, and the Brewers are still losing. I'm sorry this Mug is late, but breakfast closed at 9, so it took full focus to finish 3 laps in time.

Win Expectancy Graph
BR Box Score
BDD Recaps

Notable by their absence yesterday: Prince Fielder, Corey Hart and Jason Kendall. Apparently it was just a scheduled off day for almost half the starting position players, though.

The Yost Infection says it's time for a managerial change, even though most of this team's problems aren't Ned's fault. The time for a change was September of last year. The story now is that it hasn't happened yet.

Speaking of looming decisions, Derrick Turnbow will clear waivers soon. Looks like he's headed to Nashville.

On a positive note, Beyond the Box Score compares Matt LaPorta to Ryan Braun.

The Cub Reporter ranks Ben Sheets 4th among NL Central aces. He wants your vote to help rank them.

Or, if watching the Brewers is too much for you to handle sober, try out this drinking game. By the fifth or so, people will be stacking cups on your head.

On injuries:

Padres reliever Kevin Cameron is on the DL with an elbow strain.
Doug Davis is free of cancer. Sighs of relief all around.
Johnny Estrada is back on the DL with an inflamed nerve in his elbow.
Orlando Hernandez is no longer in a walking boot. He's one step closer to throwing the banana.
Dodgers P Esteban Loaiza is on the DL with spasms in his shoulder.
Nats C Paul Lo Duca has a broken hand and has been DL'ed.
Twins reliever Pat Neshek will have his elbow examined today after leaving last night's game.
Mets OF Angel Pagan is day-to-day with a bruised shoulder.
Braves P Brayan Pena is on the DL with a back strain.
Twins IF Nick Punto was scratched from last night's game with tightness in his hamstring.

Despite the hubbub about the Brewers only going as far as Prince Fielder will carry them, Recondite baseball notes that no Brewers make the list of top or bottom 20 in win-loss splits.

The Marlins are hot, but there's still plenty of great seats available at their games.

Reds Insider notes that new GM Walt Jocketty will get to rework his team in a hurry - the Reds will have 13 free agents after the season.

Here's video of Richie Sexson charging the mound last night. Two notes:

1) That pitch wasn't that close.
2) Richie, you're 6'6", did you really need to throw the helmet at the guy?

That's all for today. Drink up.

An off day is always a good time to practice thinking positive thoughts.

BDD Recaps
BP Postseason Odds: 79.2 and 8.2% to win the Central.

Yesterday's off day was also a pretty quiet one around the web. In fact, the biggest news is likely that there will be no news surrounding the closer's spot.

On closers, Eric Seidman at Fangraphs is working to develop a new stat that's more accurate than a pure save total. I like where he's going with it.

In his most recent "That's Debatable" at ESPN.com, Jerry Crasnick says the Brewers have too many pitching issues to overcome to be considered the top team in the NL Central.

Reportedly, the Mets are interested in Turnbow. Doug Melvin is sitting by the phone.

If you needed something disturbing to help you get through the day, here's Brian Shouse juxtaposed into classic art. Is juxtaposed the word I wanted? Perhaps I'm using it in the wrong situation...just like the Brewers use Shouse.

Here are the results from last week's Fan Opinion Poll:

• 52% of voters thought the Brewers made the right decision keeping Manny Parra on the roster and sending down Dave Bush. Of course, it's a moot point now.
• 70% of voters thought Mike Cameron should bat second. No other position got 10% of the vote.
• 52% thought Bill Hall should've swung away in the ninth inning of last Sunday's game. 43% favored the decision to bunt.
• 58% of voters were satisfied with the 13-pitcher roster. Also a moot point.
• Of those dissatisfied, 48% wanted more position players on the roster. Welcome back, Joe Dillon.
• Ned Yost's approval rating is down to 40%, with 32% disapproval and 26% unsure. He was at 47%/22%/29% last week.
• Doug Melvin's approval rating is up slightly, at 84%, with 4% disapproval and 10% unsure. He was at 83%/4%/11% last week.
• 97% of voters approve of the Cameron signing and position changes.
• 60% approve of the Gagne signing, with 17% disapproval. That's up from 47% approval last week.
• 34% of voters think the Brewers shouldn't offer Ben Sheets a new contract until after the season. 31% think the Brewers should offer him a contract now and 24% think they shouldn't offer him one at all.

Full results here. A new poll may be posted today. If you have suggestions for questions in this week's poll, I'd welcome them. Drop them in the comments.

On injuries:

Braves IF Martin Prado injured his thumb sliding into first base in a 14-7 game. He's out 6-8 weeks.
Mariners P Jarrod Washburn had to leave last night's start with tightness in his right calf.
Rockies P Kip Wells will require surgery to remove a blood clot in his right hand.

Non-Brewer related: We've been talking an awful lot in the comments lately about umpiring. The Book has an interesting post today on Angel Hernandez and how he skews umpiring statistics. I'd try to offer a better summary of it, but the more I read, the more confused I get.

That's all for today. Post your suggestions for linkage in tomorrow's Mug and/or suggested poll questions in the comments. Drink up.

I really would not like to be swept by the Astros.  Fortunately, Ben Sheets probably feels the same way.  He's matching up with Chris Sampson, which normally wouldn't feel like a fair fight, but this weekend, it seems like Houston has been spotted three home runs per game.

I answered some questions for the SBN Astros blogger; you can read what I have to say here.  And here's the BR Game Preview.  The action starts at 1:05 CT.

Project-a-tron gives the Brewers a 57.43% shot at winning today's contest.  That's about the same margin by which it favored the Astros in the opener, and we all know how that turned out.

Go Brewers!

I've got a lot of tabs open right now, which means there are a lot of links to get to.  Let's get at it.

• FanGraphs Win Probability graph
• BR Box Score
• BDD Daily Recaps
• BP Postseason Odds: 84 wins, 26% shot at the playoffs.

The big news this morning is that it's official, Turnbow is DFA'd and Dillon is back.  It's disappointing that D-Bow hasn't been able to turn it around, but I do think it's well past time we cut our losses here.  One interesting thought that has been popping up a little bit lately is that Melvin is too slow to cut the cord on his reclamation projects--Podsednik is a similar case that comes to mind.  Branch Rickey was famous for saying it's better to trade a player a year too early than a year too late, and while you get bit occasionally for making that mistake, it's better than being saddled with someone as ineffective as D-Bow is right now.

A few writers at The Hardball Times ganged up to write a massive profile of Ben Sheets, including pitch f/x data, mechanics analysis, and injury commentary.

The Junkball Blues looks at how the Crew has done against closers.  It's interesting work, but he draws the wrong conclusions.  In 13 closer appearances, we've been shut out 7 times and have scored 6 times.  That's astonishingly good, to my eyes.  Would you happy if your team's closer gave up a run or more every other appearance?  That's essentially what we're turning opposition closers into.

Some injury news:

• Troy Tulowitzki will be out for a month, maybe two.
• Phil Hughes has a broken rib , and will probably be out for at least two months.
• Jimmy Rollins won't be back as scheduled, and there's no clear timetable for when he will be.

I'm not going to wade very far into the muck of the Bissinger/Costas/Leitch controversy, but I will point you to this great piece by Joe Posnanski, who straddles the blogger/reporter divide quite gracefully.  And I'll say one more thing.  Bissinger may have been honing his craft for 40 years, but his LaRussa book, Three Nights In August, was truly dreadful.  Possibly the worst baseball book I have ever read.  There is nothing more insulting than a quasi-analytical hagiography about an overrated, self-aggrandizing figure like TLR.

A couple of ex-Brewers notes.  Richie Sexson hit his 300th career home run, and Greg Aquino cleared waivers (big surprise--his ERA is roughly the same as Turnbow's) and is headed to Norfolk.  I don't remember seeing this in an earlier Mug, but Brady Clark is also in AAA--he talked about retiring, but has opted to spend some quality time with Claudio Vargas in New Orleans.

I think the Nationals Enquirer had too much to drink.  Careful kids: drinking and photoshopping don't mix.

Derrick Goold has a nice article about Rick Ankiel and Pat Jordan's writing about him.  When we played the Cards recently, I was thinking about the stories in baseball today that we'd still be talking about 40 or 50 years from now, and Ankiel is definitely one of them.

It's amazing how rarely I agree with Richard Justice.  A couple of days ago, he decided to rip on the Astros FO for choosing Max Sapp, a high school catcher, in the first round of the 2006 draft.  Amazingly, he uses the phrase, "they blew it" to describe the results of a draft pick made two years ago.  True, Sapp is struggling in A ball, but dude, he's two years out of high school.  He's younger than a lot of the guys who will be drafted this year.  And anyway, first-round picks fizzle sometimes.  We're doing just fine without the services of Jeremy Jeffress, who we chose well before the Astros picked Sapp.

Finally, a happy story.  John Wilson is a 53-year-old senior at Penn State Altoona, and a key part of their baseball program.  He's friends with Dusty Baker, too, though I guess I can forgive him for that.

Drink up, but don't drink it too fast.  This cup runneth over!

So, don't get me wrong, I'm excited for a win, but 3:40 for a nine-inning game? There's a lot of stuff I could've done in that time.

Win Expectancy Graph
BR Box Score
BDD Recaps
BP Postseason Odds: 85.2 wins and a 22.9% shot at the Central.

Today's interesting side note from BP Odds: A month into the season, BP has the Rays as the most likely playoff team from the AL East, at 42%. The Yankees and Red Sox are both down in the 30's.

Of course, last night's win was largely sparked by the return of Mike Cameron. The JS Blog has quotes from him afterwards.

After the game, Sheets also reported no pain, so hopefully last night was just a rough first day back and he'll be back to normal for the next one.

I have yet to see or hear a report on the condition of umpire Jerry Crawford, who left last night's game early. Most media outlets are just saying he wasn't feeling well, but Baseball Musings says he was complaining of chest pains.

There's no respectful way to transition from a story about chest pain to a story about Derrick Turnbow. There just isn't.

The Brewers are #12 in the latest Bugs and Cranks Power Rankings.

On Injuries:

Nats closer Chad Cordero is headed to the DL with a strained muscle in his shoulder.
Alex Rodriguez's quad injury finally landed him on the DL.
John Smoltz, currently on the DL, is contemplating making the unprecedented move from starter to closer to starter and back to the bullpen again.

If you go out for a walk today, try not to trip over a former Brewer looking for work: Chad Moeller, recently DFA'd by the Yankees, could join Raul Casanova on the Mets. The Orioles DFA'd Greg Aquino yesterday. And Ray King refused to report to AAA and has been released.

It's an annual ritual of spring: Ken Rosenthal seems to think Adam Dunn and Ken Griffey could be on the move soon. I'd be more likely to believe it if we didn't have this conversation every spring, and if the Reds hadn't just signed Cordero and Dusty Baker to win now. But, just like Bronson Arroyo, trade rumors swim in circles.

That's all I've got for today. As always, feel free to leave a comment if you have something to include in a future Mug. Drink up.

Lots of storylines here, in addition to the usual Cubs-Brewers stuff.  Sheets is back, let's hope for more than 5 innings.  Cameron has finally arrived, though with the way Kapler and Gwynn played, we didn't miss him very much.  And, of course, we only had the one day off, so we need a lot of innings from our starters to protect our hopeless overworked bullpen (TM).

The matchup is Sheets and Jason Marquis, starting at 7:05 CT.  The Cubs are Soriano-less, but with the way the rest of the lineup has been hitting, it really doesn't matter.  If you want to delve deeper into the splits, here's the BR Game Preview.

I'm not sure I'm going to keep doing this for every game all season long, but at least for this series, I fired up the Project-a-Tron again.  ZiPS really doesn't like Marquis this year, so it gives the Brewers a pretty big edge:

• Brewers 5.85
• Cubs 4.5
• Brewers WinExp: 57%

That's as dramatic of a difference as the Project-a-Tron has spit out all year; without taking home-field into account, it's a 62/38 split in favor of the Crew.  Mr. Tron, of course, is assuming that Sheets will give us 6+, and that his arm won't fall off.

Go Brewers!